Electronic Arts announced a downsizing of BioWare yesterday that saw "many" employees being moved to other studios within the company while "a core team" continues work on the next Mass Effect. EA declined to comment on whether the restructuring would also result in layoffs, but to absolutely no one's surprise, it has, including some serious veteran talent.
Shortly after the restructuring announcement went live, both Karin and Trick Weekes revealed on Bluesky that they were no longer with the studio. Both are well-known BioWare veterans: Trick Weekes served as a writer on all the games and expansions in the original Mass Effect trilogy, as well as Dragon Age: Origins and Inquisition, before becoming lead writer on Dragon Age: The Veilguard, while Karin Weekes served as an editor on Mass Effect 2, 3, and Andromeda, Dragon Age: Origins, DA2, and Inquisition, Anthem, and Star Wars: The Old Republic.
Also confirming that they've been go are:
- Ryan Cormier, editor on Star Wars: The Old Republic, Anthem, and Dragon Age: The Veilguard
- Jennifer Cheverie, a tester, analyst and producer on Mass Effect 3, Dragon Age: Inquisition, Anthem, and Veilguard
- Daniel Steed, a producer on Star Wars: The Old Republic – Legacy of the Sith and Dragon Age: The Veilguard
- Lina Anderson, senior product manager
- Michelle Flamm, systems designer
- Mad Bee, UX designer
The layoffs come less than two weeks after Dragon Age: The Veilguard game director Corinne Busche announced her own departure from BioWare, and just a week after EA said Veilguard had underperformed sales expectations: Despite hitting a peak concurrent player count of more than 89,000 on Steam alone at launch (a figure good enough to put it in Steam's daily top 10 for that metric), and "engaging" roughly 1.5 million players during the quarter (I use that term because it's not explicitly synonymous with sales), EA said Veilguard was "down nearly 50% from the company’s expectations."
Collectively, the cuts represent a major loss of creative talent for the studio, and bears echoes of BioWare's layoff of roughly 50 employees in 2023, which included Mary Kirby, a writer on all the Dragon Age games and creator of some of the series' best-loved characters. As PC Gamer's Fraser Brown said when that round of layoffs took place, "If you've enjoyed the writing in any Dragon Age games, you've probably got Kirby to thank."
I'm also reminded of comments made by former BioWare writer and designer David Gaider, who said in 2023 that attitudes about writers at the studio had soured prior to his departure in 2016. "Even BioWare, which built its success on a reputation for good stories and characters, slowly turned from a company that vocally valued its writers to one where we were... quietly resented, with a reliance on expensive narrative seen as the 'albatross' holding the company back," Gaider wrote at the time.
"Maybe that sounds like a heavy charge, but it's what I distinctly felt up until I left in 2016. Suddenly all anyone in charge was asking was 'how do we have LESS writing?' A good story would simply happen, via magic wand, rather than be something that needed support and priority."
The whole episode casts an ugly light on EA's insistence that all is well at BioWare, and particularly that the next Mass Effect game—which seemingly remains in pre-production despite being confirmed more than four years ago—is being developed "under the leadership of veterans from the original trilogy." Not that it's untrue—longtime BioWare producer Michael Gamble is leading the effort—but it is galling to see vague promises about an anticipated videogame used as a smokescreen for the removal of veteran staff that EA won't specifically identify the departure of.
